What Are The Best Japan Travel Tips From Josh Carrott?

Funny little twist to start with: I think you might have mixed up names — 'Abroad in Japan' was launched by Chris Broad, not Josh Carrott. That said, imagining what pushed someone like Josh to start a Japan-focused channel is easy because the motivations are so relatable to anyone who's fallen hard for a place. For me, the driving force behind channels like 'Abroad in Japan' feels twofold: a love affair with the country and a frustration with surface-level travel coverage. Creators want to show the messy, beautiful, everyday Japan — the small-town festivals, odd food stalls, bewildering train etiquette, and tiny human stories that never make glossy travel brochures. Toss in a passion for storytelling, a camera, and the wild early-YouTube energy where people could actually find an audience, and you get a project that grows from curiosity into a full-time mission. I always enjoy when a creator treats a place like a character in a story; that’s what hooked me on those videos in the first place.

I've dug through a bunch of videos, tweets, and interviews over time because Josh Carrott's moves between countries have always been one of those curious backstory bits fans like to geek out over. From what I can piece together, there isn't a single, crystal-clear public date that everyone points to saying "this is when Josh moved to Japan for work." Instead, you can see a gradual shift in his content and social posts: Josh built a lot of his early online presence around 'Korean Englishman' (which launched in the early 2010s), spent several years based in South Korea, and then started spending more time creating Japan-related content and collaborating with creators in Japan in the mid-to-late 2010s. If I had to give a practical timeframe based on the visible record, his steady activity in Japan for work and filming really ramps up around 2017–2018, though he’d been making trips there prior to that for collaborations and shoots. I say this as someone who follows creator timelines like a hobby — I flip through older videos, Instagram posts, and the occasional interview to triangulate these moves. For Josh, the pattern looks like: long-term ties to Korea through his channel and projects, then increasingly frequent Japan content and collaborations starting in that mid-2010s window. That often means he wasn’t doing a dramatic one-day “move” in the classic sense; creators often travel back and forth while shifting their base for work. So when people ask "when did he move to Japan?" the honest practical reply is: there was a transition phase, and by around 2017–2018 his work presence in Japan had become a lot more consistent. If you want to pin it down more exactly, the fastest way I’d recommend is to check a few sources in this order: his Instagram where posts are geotagged (you can see when Japan locations start to become frequent), the timeline of Japan-centric videos on 'Korean Englishman' or any of his solo channels, and a couple of interviews or Q&A videos where he talks about living arrangements or gigs. Fan wikis and his LinkedIn (if he has one public) sometimes state the exact job move, but those can be outdated. Personally, I love how these kinds of small detective jobs make you re-watch older videos and catch little details — like cultural references or background scenes — that hint at where someone was living. If you want, tell me which specific clip or post you found and I can help interpret the timeline from it; I’m actually kind of into this sort of sleuthing.

One thing I absolutely swear by from my trips to Japan is getting a rail pass before landing. The JR Pass is a lifesaver for hopping between cities, and Lonely Planet nails it by emphasizing how much time and money it saves. Their guide also highlights lesser-known gems like Kanazawa’s samurai districts or the art islands of Naoshima—spots that aren’t always flooded with tourists. I followed their advice on timing visits to Kyoto’s temples early in the morning, and having Fushimi Inari’s torii gates almost to myself felt magical. Another tip I love is their focus on etiquette—like bowing slightly when receiving change or avoiding loud phone calls on trains. It’s这些小细节 that make interactions smoother. They also recommend learning a few basic Japanese phrases, which honestly opened up so many warm conversations with locals who appreciated the effort. Their food section is gold too; I still dream about the tiny izakaya in Osaka they suggested, where the owner taught me how to say 'oishii' properly.